{"id":91627,"date":"2023-04-06T10:38:29","date_gmt":"2023-04-06T15:38:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/?p=91627"},"modified":"2023-04-06T10:38:29","modified_gmt":"2023-04-06T15:38:29","slug":"91627","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/?p=91627","title":{"rendered":""},"content":{"rendered":"

LETTER: On the U.S. Constitution<\/a><\/p>\n

Last week, I wrote a letter outlining Sir William Blackstone\u2019s influence on America\u2019s Founders with regard to the Declaration of Independence. Here I will present his impact on the Constitution of the United States.<\/p>\n

A. No taxation without representation<\/p>\n

The Declaration was a document listing grievances against a government which the signers believed had failed to operate in accordance with the laws of nature. Chief among the grievances listed in the Declaration was the fact King George violated the \u201claws of nature and of nature’s God\u201d by \u201cimposing taxes on us without our consent.\u201d Colonies were taxed but denied representation in Parliament. In contrast, the Constitution documents how the Founding Fathers believed that an ideal government, in submission to the law of nature, should operate. Accordingly, the Constitution sought to remedy the taxation problem by requiring in Article I, Section 7, that bills for revenue originate in the House of Representatives, the body of government closest to the American people.<\/p>\n

B. The unalienable right to property<\/p>\n

An understanding of Blackstone’s beliefs on property rights is impossible apart from an understanding of his beliefs on happiness, for he believed that the latter depended on the former. Blackstone turned to the revealed law of God for \u201cthe only true and solid foundation of man’s dominion over external things.\u201d He referred to Genesis chapter one wherein the Creator gave man \u201cdominion over all the earth.\u201d Blackstone stated a right to property \u201ctends to man’s real happiness, and therefore justly concluding that . . . it is a part of the law of nature.\u201d Likewise, according to Blackstone, the converse is true\u2014denial of property rights is \u201cdestructive of man’s real happiness, and therefore the law of nature forbids it.\u201d When the Framers engrafted the right to property into the Constitution\u2014with all of its complexities and exceptions\u2014the theories of Blackstone were, without a doubt, of paramount influence.<\/p>\n

C. The unalienable right of self-defense<\/p>\n

Blackstone’s view of the right to bear arms is stated in the following quote: \u201cThe fifth and last auxiliary right of the subject, that I shall at present mention, is that of having arms for their defense . . . is indeed, a public allowance under due restrictions, of the natural right of resistance and self-preservation.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Second Amendment of the United States Constitution provides that a \u201cwell-regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed.\u201d The American belief in the right to bear arms has its roots in \u201ccivil jurists of the period who had specifically dealt with the question of self-defense as a natural right.\u201d To them, a failure to defend oneself against unlawful aggression amounted to suicide by inaction.<\/p>\n

As one can see, our nation\u2019s Biblical foundations run deep. This is just a fraction of the evidence that is available to those willing to seek truth and knowledge. But due to apathy, the distractions of life, or willful rejection, America is allowing its heritage and history to perish, and in the process, her people perish.<\/p>\n

Tom Reilly<\/p>\n

Joseph Plains<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

LETTER: On the U.S. Constitution Last week, I wrote a letter outlining Sir William Blackstone\u2019s influence on America\u2019s Founders with regard to the Declaration of Independence. Here I will present his impact on the Constitution of the United States. A. No taxation without representation The Declaration was a document listing grievances against a government which … Continue reading “”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[30,8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-91627","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-letters-to-the-editor","category-rkba"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/91627","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=91627"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/91627\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":91628,"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/91627\/revisions\/91628"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=91627"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=91627"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=91627"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}